Before bed last night, I came across this New Yorker article from 2016 that I thought was fascinating and broadly useful for both life and business. In it, Maria Konnikova talks about how people learn to become resilient. And she starts by citing the work of a developmental psychologist and clinician who spent decades studying why some people seem to manage stress and trauma far better than others. Here is an excerpt talking about why that might be the case:
From a young age, resilient children tended to “meet the world on their own terms.” They were autonomous and independent, would seek out new experiences, and had a “positive social orientation.” “Though not especially gifted, these children used whatever skills they had effectively,” Werner wrote. Perhaps most importantly, the resilient children had what psychologists call an “internal locus of control”: they believed that they, and not their circumstances, affected their achievements. The resilient children saw themselves as the orchestrators of their own fates. In fact, on a scale that measured locus of control, they scored more than two standard deviations away from the standardization group.
It immediately reminded me of something that Steve Jobs once said in an interview back when more people wore buttoned up jean shirts. His comment was that one of the most powerful things you can learn in life is that much of what surrounds us was created by people who are no smarter than us. His point being that everything can be altered. We all have that ability. We are "orchestrators of our own fate."
Before bed last night, I came across this New Yorker article from 2016 that I thought was fascinating and broadly useful for both life and business. In it, Maria Konnikova talks about how people learn to become resilient. And she starts by citing the work of a developmental psychologist and clinician who spent decades studying why some people seem to manage stress and trauma far better than others. Here is an excerpt talking about why that might be the case:
From a young age, resilient children tended to “meet the world on their own terms.” They were autonomous and independent, would seek out new experiences, and had a “positive social orientation.” “Though not especially gifted, these children used whatever skills they had effectively,” Werner wrote. Perhaps most importantly, the resilient children had what psychologists call an “internal locus of control”: they believed that they, and not their circumstances, affected their achievements. The resilient children saw themselves as the orchestrators of their own fates. In fact, on a scale that measured locus of control, they scored more than two standard deviations away from the standardization group.
It immediately reminded me of something that Steve Jobs once said in an interview back when more people wore buttoned up jean shirts. His comment was that one of the most powerful things you can learn in life is that much of what surrounds us was created by people who are no smarter than us. His point being that everything can be altered. We all have that ability. We are "orchestrators of our own fate."
The article goes on to argue that one of the ways we can exhibit a strong internal locus of control is by learning to view and respond to situations in a productive way. Put differently, whether or not we are subjected to shitty experiences matters less than how we ultimately react to and view those shitty experiences. If you can reframe and place in positive terms, then you can reduce any perceived stresses and become more resilient.
The good news is that, supposedly, these are skills that can be learned. So if this topic is at all interesting, I would encourage you to check out the full article. It certainly caught my attention before bed last night.
I get that real estate developers don't always have the best of reputations. We build buildings that cast shadows. We invest in (or gentrify) neighborhoods. And yes, like every other for-profit business, the goal is to make a bit of money along the way.
But believe it or not, there are developers out there who care deeply about the work that they do. They care about their craft. And they want to do the right thing.
This morning I came across two news item that are interesting in their own right, but also have a noteworthy relationship.
$AAPL now has a market cap that exceeds $1 trillion. And not surprisingly, everyone, from the New York Times to Bloomberg (photo essay), is talking about it.
But the one thing that continues to stand out for me about this story is what Steve Jobs said back in 2011 when he unveiled iPad 2.
He said that fundamental to Apple’s DNA is its ability to marry technology with the liberal arts and the humanities. Its secret sauce is not technology alone.
Now let’s move on to the second piece of news that caught my attention.
As of 2017, less than 5% of college and university students in the US were studying one of the big four humanities majors – a sharp cliff-like drop from 2011 according to this data.
That’s almost certainly because business degrees and STEM degrees are thought to be more valuable and in demand in the labor market. And I’m sure they are right out of school.
But perhaps we shouldn’t forget Apple’s trillion dollar lesson. And I think this goes for both the tech space and the real estate industry, as well as others.
The article goes on to argue that one of the ways we can exhibit a strong internal locus of control is by learning to view and respond to situations in a productive way. Put differently, whether or not we are subjected to shitty experiences matters less than how we ultimately react to and view those shitty experiences. If you can reframe and place in positive terms, then you can reduce any perceived stresses and become more resilient.
The good news is that, supposedly, these are skills that can be learned. So if this topic is at all interesting, I would encourage you to check out the full article. It certainly caught my attention before bed last night.
I get that real estate developers don't always have the best of reputations. We build buildings that cast shadows. We invest in (or gentrify) neighborhoods. And yes, like every other for-profit business, the goal is to make a bit of money along the way.
But believe it or not, there are developers out there who care deeply about the work that they do. They care about their craft. And they want to do the right thing.
This morning I came across two news item that are interesting in their own right, but also have a noteworthy relationship.
$AAPL now has a market cap that exceeds $1 trillion. And not surprisingly, everyone, from the New York Times to Bloomberg (photo essay), is talking about it.
But the one thing that continues to stand out for me about this story is what Steve Jobs said back in 2011 when he unveiled iPad 2.
He said that fundamental to Apple’s DNA is its ability to marry technology with the liberal arts and the humanities. Its secret sauce is not technology alone.
Now let’s move on to the second piece of news that caught my attention.
As of 2017, less than 5% of college and university students in the US were studying one of the big four humanities majors – a sharp cliff-like drop from 2011 according to this data.
That’s almost certainly because business degrees and STEM degrees are thought to be more valuable and in demand in the labor market. And I’m sure they are right out of school.
But perhaps we shouldn’t forget Apple’s trillion dollar lesson. And I think this goes for both the tech space and the real estate industry, as well as others.
Perhaps the best way for me to start to explain what I'm getting at here is to quote the late Steve Jobs. An obsessive perfectionist, Jobs was known for focusing on every little detail in the projects that he worked on. Here's an excerpt from an interview he did for Playboy back in 1985:
"We just wanted to build the best thing we could build. When you’re a carpenter making a beautiful chest of drawers, you’re not going to use a piece of plywood on the back, even though it faces the wall and nobody will ever see it. You’ll know it’s there, so you’re going to use a beautiful piece of wood on the back. For you to sleep well at night, the aesthetic, the quality, has to be carried all the way through."
As a developer and a fake architect, this paragraph really resonates with me. But here's the thing. One of the differences between making a beautiful chest of drawers (or a computer) and making a beautiful building, is that buildings have an inordinate amount of rules that tell you what you can build where and then how you need to build.
Some of these rules, of course, make a lot of sense. Life safety is no joke. But some of these rules also make no sense. And sometimes these rules -- that don't make sense -- prevent you from putting what I would metaphorically consider to be that beautiful piece of wood on the back.
The beautiful piece of wood isn't about money. In fact, it's going to cost you more compared to just using a piece of plywood. It's about giving a shit and caring about your craft, even if nobody else does. It's so you can sleep well at night.
Perhaps the best way for me to start to explain what I'm getting at here is to quote the late Steve Jobs. An obsessive perfectionist, Jobs was known for focusing on every little detail in the projects that he worked on. Here's an excerpt from an interview he did for Playboy back in 1985:
"We just wanted to build the best thing we could build. When you’re a carpenter making a beautiful chest of drawers, you’re not going to use a piece of plywood on the back, even though it faces the wall and nobody will ever see it. You’ll know it’s there, so you’re going to use a beautiful piece of wood on the back. For you to sleep well at night, the aesthetic, the quality, has to be carried all the way through."
As a developer and a fake architect, this paragraph really resonates with me. But here's the thing. One of the differences between making a beautiful chest of drawers (or a computer) and making a beautiful building, is that buildings have an inordinate amount of rules that tell you what you can build where and then how you need to build.
Some of these rules, of course, make a lot of sense. Life safety is no joke. But some of these rules also make no sense. And sometimes these rules -- that don't make sense -- prevent you from putting what I would metaphorically consider to be that beautiful piece of wood on the back.
The beautiful piece of wood isn't about money. In fact, it's going to cost you more compared to just using a piece of plywood. It's about giving a shit and caring about your craft, even if nobody else does. It's so you can sleep well at night.
